Problem is - I travel too much with my job and I never trusted signal strength to any other carrier besides Verizon...

You can always roam onto Verizon's network (part of it at least) and though data will be MIA, voice will not be. There are a few places I've travelled for my job where the data hasn't worked, but these are either extremely weird places (Trona, CA) or vacation places (Spanish Bay, CA).

PimpDaddy...you and I have known each other a LONG TIME! I thought I taught you better then to deal with the bottom-feeders when you have an issue. If you don't want to be mummified in clerical mush, you have to self-escalate. Here is a URL for a website that is by/for Verizon users. Has a lot of great phone numbers, etc. They also have one for Sprint users, and it is a goldmine for bypassing the Clerical Monster.http://www.vzwinfo.com/

Problem is - I travel too much with my job and I never trusted signal strength to any other carrier besides Verizon...

I've had great coverage from Sprint everywhere I've travelled (in the US). I never have a problem, except in my own home: Seattle, Los Angeles, San Jose, Vegas, Houston, Minneapolis, New York, Atlanta, Memphis, all over Florida...

I've was on SPCS pre-2002 with terrible service in the areas I spent the most time in CA, CO, TX, DC, and MO. In fact, the best reception for Sprint was in the city Minneapolis - it went bad outside of the city though. Now that they have a reasonably priced roaming agreement, I might consider Sprint again if ACE is tempting enough.

Has their customer service improved as well? That was another thing that bugged me about Sprint. Her name was "Claire" back then.

I've was on SPCS pre-2002 with terrible service in the areas I spent the most time in CA, CO, TX, DC, and MO. In fact, the best reception for Sprint was in the city Minneapolis - it went bad outside of the city though. Now that they have a reasonably priced roaming agreement, I might consider Sprint again if ACE is tempting enough.

Has their customer service improved as well? That was another thing that bugged me about Sprint. Her name was "Claire" back then.

Claire now works for Verizon, I have nicknamed her, "my little Nietzsche." ;-)

My god, my bill is over 1k, I have various things that are all supposed to stop data connection accept for on-demand and I have barley used it and have software that forces it off, yet my phone apparently has been cheerfully calling away on it's own and now verizon wants to charge me for minutes I in no way used or gave the phone permission to use. Oh they will happy wave all that if I just pony up money for data plan I don't want or need? No sir that boat will not float.

I gave up Verizon years ago, bad attitudes all around, and at that time you could'nt get a good signal, I always thought they where spending more money trying to convince us they had good reception then on getting good reception
I have been with sprint for a couple of years and have had no bad exsperiences with them, their Customer service has always been polite and helpful for me, and their coverage has been decent where I live UT.

My god, my bill is over 1k, I have various things that are all supposed to stop data connection accept for on-demand and I have barley used it and have software that forces it off, yet my phone apparently has been cheerfully calling away on it's own and now verizon wants to charge me for minutes I in no way used or gave the phone permission to use. Oh they will happy wave all that if I just pony up money for data plan I don't want or need? No sir that boat will not float.

A little while back VZW was sued in class action for some billing issues. I must disclaim that I am a member of one of the classes. It looks like VZW has some issues with their phones, but that is no reason to try and create a class action, it's just a waste of time and the reason that everyone thinks that lawyers get so rich off of them is because these class actions usually are not cases where enough injustice has been done to warrant a large settlement (so take out lawyers fees, divide rest by the class and it equals next to nothing per person). Save your energy and go fight a better battle.

Just to update everyone - Verizon (as of today) denied me any credit and although they can see in the bill that I have overlapping Data calls with Voice calls, they denied me. I called in again to have more "research" done and they are supoosed to get back to me.

I spend a lot of time on the phone with the phone companies. I also worked tech support for Bellsouth DSL for a while. So here's my vaguely professional suggestions (many of which I'm sure you've already thought about):

1) When I call the phone company, I'm often transferred to "customer care," who usually can't do anything billing-related. The next time you have to call them, start off by saying, "I have a billing issue." That phrase has saved me hours of having to re-tell my sob-stories to multiple people before I find the right one.

2) Immediately ask to speak with their supervisor. Good CSR's will generally ask you why, and try to be helpful. It lets them know that you're angry and have a complex issue, without feeling like you blame them. Bad CSR's will want to avoid you like the plague, and as such they're more likely to pass you along to someone else. Some companies require that the customer ask twice before the CSR is allowed to escalate a call.

3) Let them know, up front, that you're not going to pay the bill. Let them know also that you know how far to take it, and where. Let them know that you're willing to spend many hours on the issue, and aren't going to let it drop no matter what. Some key phrases to use are, "FCC," "Better Business Bureau," and "Small Claims Court."

4) Keep as accurate records of all calls as you can. Have your laptop ready, and record the time, date, duration, and CSR names for all calls. Ask the CSR what call center they're located in, who their supervisor is, and if they have an ID number. It's a lot more impressive if, when you have to call back for the 8th time, you can rattle this information off. It demonstrates that you have a real problem, and aren't just some nut-job looking for a free ride.

5) Always start off being nice to them. Say something like, "Claire, I'm sorry if I sound angry or if I'm short with you. I've already spent 6 hours on the phone with your coworkers, and they haven't helped me at all." If they prove to be stupid, incompetent, or mean, then they deserve your full wrath.

6) Salespeople are your friends. See, the phone company doesn't give a crap about you once they have you locked into a contract. So they pay their support and billing people $6/hour, treat them like dirt, and don't invest much training in them. On the other hand, salespeople are usually paid well. They're usually intelligent, lucid, and well-trained. Most importantly, they usually have a direct line that you can call them on. If you can find a good salesperson (or go through whomever you got the phone from), they can often be very helpful. Not all of them have access to billing stuff, but many do (and many more can provide incentives or credit).

7) Some companies (not sure if this is true for cell phones) have "save teams." Basically, whenever a customer threatens to cancel service, they're transferred to a CSR whose sole job is to make customers happy. If worst comes to worst, you can threaten cancellation, and hope for a save team/customer resolution person to solve your problem.

I spend a lot of time on the phone with the phone companies. ..
Nareau

This has got to be one of the best postings I have read on how to handle these types of problems.

Unfortunately, it means time, and time is money. Those bastards don't care about the time you waste in tracking this stuff down. In fact, they like the fact that it takes time because, for some people, time is a very scarce resource. It's easier to just eat the bill and move on.

I don't know how Verizon charge for data but this is how GSM should work.

When the black triangle above your signal appears, you are what is known as GPRS attached. Signalling data will pass only between the SGSN and the Base Station Controller, to update state, location etc.

When the green arrows are up it means you have a PDP context set against an Access Point on the SGSN, this is a relationship between the SGSN and the terminal device, it in itself is not a connection, but a state, you have a NAT'd I.P address and are assigned a QOS. Again the only data is signalling.

The only time charging should be invoked is when data is drawn through the Gateway GRPS Support Node, more particularly the Gi interface which sits between the www/dmz and the GSM/UMTS network.

In short you should only be charged for data actually retrieved from the web. The idea that "searching" would result in data charges is absurd, the only data passed is signalling information and the poorer the network the more that is required. Data not pulled though a PDP context will not be charged(or should not be).

Note that a virus could also create said context and then go about retrieving and sending pretty much what it wanted(depending on how "open" the network is). Nothing that sophisticated for palmOS/Treo at the moment I don't think. Will occur though.